Chopping block: Mowing along highways

One reader had this suggestion: “Discontinue mowing along the highways.”

The Texas Department of Transportation usually contracts landscaping companies to take care of overgrowing vegetation and weeds along Texas highways. Last year, the department spent $40 million on the contracts.

Randy Ormsby, a department spokesman, said in the last two years, TXDOT changed its policy to include less frequent mowing. Contracts cost the department a total of $47 million in 2009, and $59 million a year earlier.

The department does not do the work of the contractors, but where sharp turns or intersections present immediate safety hazards, TXDOT will send its own workers to mow the area.

“I don’t believe it would ever be possible for us to stop mowing,” Ormsby said.